Lesney Products & Co v Nolan | |
Court: | Court of Appeal |
Citations: | [1976] EWCA Civ 8, [1977] ICR 235 |
Keywords: | Redundancy, dismissal |
Lesney Products & Co v Nolan [1976] EWCA Civ 8 is a UK labour law case concerning redundancy.
Lesney Products & Co removed its night shift and divided its day shift into two. The company still produced the same amount of products (even though demand had fallen) but it was no longer giving overtime to its workers. Employees who saw their wages drop by a third refused to work on the new day shift. They were dismissed and they claimed redundancy.
The Tribunal upheld the employees' claim.
Lord Denning MR said that the employees were not redundant, because the employer had a legitimate business reason for wishing to vary the contracts, and the employees' non-acceptance effectively amounted to a voluntary resignation.
Stephenson LJ and Shaw LJ concurred.